The Boy I Once Hated: Love & Hate Duet
The Boy I Once Hated: Chapter 7

Sixteen years old

If I had harbored a smidge of hope that life would be easier for me when I moved to Thatcher’s Bay last month, I was sorely mistaken. In reality, it’s only gotten worse.

Back at my old school, I could at least take comfort in the knowledge that I was just a blip on everyone’s radar, and that most of my days were completely uneventful, with nothing noteworthy to look forward to. As boring as that may sound, I relished in the mundaneness of it all. Most of the kids at school would leave me alone out of fear of Daisy’s retribution if they ever even thought of messing with me, and I, for one, was happy to reap the spoils of that fear and live my life without the added worry that I would be put on some sort of spotlight.

But the minute I stepped foot on this island, all those perks went away.

Where before I was just Daisy’s younger sister and no one of real importance, now I’m Noah’s stepsister, and by the looks of it, that makes me public enemy number one. I wouldn’t be surprised if Noah sent out a newsletter or a tweet to all his minions, telling them that whoever made my life extra miserable would be in his good graces for life.

I’m not sure how I ended up being on his shit list, but not only did I get on it, I’m pretty sure my name is listed right at the top of the damn thing. That’s not true. I know exactly what got me there. It was that stupid blowjob. Walking in on him while some girl got him off was Noah’s special brand of welcoming me into the family. It told me that he didn’t give a shit what I thought of him, and that he would make it so that the world wouldn’t give a shit about me either.

To say that school has become my least favorite place in the entire world is the understatement of the decade.

There hasn’t been a day where I could walk through Bayshore High’s halls without someone accidentally bumping into me hard enough that I end up falling to the floor on my hands and knees. It’s happened so many times now that it’s no wonder the first person I’m on a first-name basis with is the school nurse. The amount of scrapes and bruises I’ve gotten in the past few weeks is ridiculous, and frankly, they’re starting to be a little hard to hide from my mother and sister. Not that they’ve had much time to notice them. With Mom starting a new job and still being in her honeymoon phase, she’s been too preoccupied to see that I hate it here.

And as for Daisy…well…Daisy is just being Daisy.

Coming to Bayshore High has become sort of a challenge for her.

She won’t be satisfied until she’s left her mark on the school.

And in true Daisy fashion, I’d say that before the year is through, she’ll get her wish. If Noah told his followers that, like me, my sister was persona non grata at Bayshore High, then they didn’t get the memo. It took less than a day for Daisy to have everyone eating out of the palm of her hand and have them all hanging on her every word. Where I’ve hated every minute of living on this godforsaken island, Daisy took to it like a fish to water. It’s like she has lived here all her life and grown up with these assholes.

The ugly and resentful side of me sometimes wishes she wasn’t having such a good time and was just as miserable as I am. If she was having a hard time settling here, then I at least would have someone to bitch with.

But just like back home, I have no one.

All I have are the fictional characters in my head to keep me company.

Say what you will about being an outcast, but it does have its strong points.

Never has my muse been more pronounced and active as it is now. It’s like it thrives on every moment of hardship, helping me create the most interesting situations and complex villains I have to date. And boy, is one particular person the muse for my overactive imagination.

Noah.

The blue-eyed boy that hides his stellar eyes behind long dirty blond hair.

The bane of my existence is also the source of the best writing I’ve ever done. Sometimes when I come home after a grueling day at school, my hands can’t write all the ideas that pop into my head fast enough. Sure, my scribblings are mostly ways of inflicting pain on my nemesis, but hey, when inspiration strikes, you roll with it.

I hate to admit it, but his hatred of me has inspired some of my best work.

Tales of revenge.

Scenes of utter carnage and destruction.

And…this is a big one…my first sex scene.

I don’t want to dissect why it was so easy for me to finally write such a scene with Noah in mind, but I can’t deny that it was. It felt natural. Almost inevitable. The ripping of shirts and buttons flying left and right across a room. The hungry stares and shallow breaths. The loud drumming of two heartbeats. I could see it so clearly in my mind’s eye. I could even taste it. Taste him.

Again, I don’t want to think too hard on why that is. It would only block my words from pouring out so fluidly and effortlessly like they have done if I were to question the reason behind this spurt of creativity. And if this is my only silver lining of living at Thatcher’s Bay, then so be it.

I once read an article somewhere that an artist needed to suffer for their art for it to be truly great.

If that really is the case, then I willingly volunteer to become the puppet on a string of my stepbrother’s cruelty. His white-hot anger fuels my own. Every snide remark and dirty look taps into a part of me that I’ve kept bottled up for far too long, and it’s oddly liberating to just let it all out without fear of being scrutinized or judged for it.

If I had to put into words how I feel when Noah is showing me his worst, coaxing me to rise to his level, I would have to say that it feels a lot like freedom. The air tastes different on the tip of my tongue when I’m cursing him out. My skin feels hot to the touch while my heart threatens to explode in my chest with how hard it starts beating. All of me feels like a flickering flame, heating up to brand-new heights anytime he forces me to confront him.

It’s terribly addicting.

Although I’m pretty sure none of this is healthy.

How could it be?

Even though this little game of ours is far from normal behavior, I can’t replace the will to stop. Not when it feels like I’m finally living.

Huh.

Who would have thought that hate could taste this sweet?

Be the inspiration I needed to push my writing to the next level?

Chaucer and Nietzsche sacrificed their mental well-being for their art, right? So why can’t I?

Because let’s face it, kindling this rivalry between Noah and I just for the sake of writing a good chapter, is not what a sane person would do. A mentally stable person would try to go out of their way to make peace, whereas I am doing everything in my power just to piss my rival off further.

Hence why I decided that today I would step it up a notch and see if I could push his buttons in some other way besides merely existing. But to do that, I need to gather some intel and do a little reconnaissance mission. A sneak peek into the mind of my bully, if you will. What better way to learn your enemy’s secrets than to sneak into his room and see if he has any of them lying around.

With our parents at work, and Daisy off to God knows where, the house is completely empty of anyone who could spoil my fun. As per usual, Noah is outside in the garage fiddling with his bike. I’ve lived here long enough to know that’s how he likes to spend his afternoons, listening to loud rap music while he messes around with his precious Yamaha. He’s an animal of habit, so I know I’ve got a few hours before he comes upstairs to take a shower before dinner, giving me ample time to get the job done without him being none the wiser about it.

Fueled with palpitating adrenaline, I leave my room and walk across the hall over to his. Ever so slowly, I turn the doorknob to his bedroom and smile when I open it with ease. On bare feet, I walk inside, my gaze soaking up every dust particle in the room. The first thing I notice is that for a teenage boy, Noah sure keeps his devil’s lair spick and span. His bed is neatly made. His textbooks on top of his desk are carefully stacked into one arranged pile, and there isn’t a piece of dirty laundry on the floor like I expected to replace. In fact, Daisy could take pointers from Noah on how to keep a room so clean. It’s immaculately spotless.

Hmm.

That doesn’t bode well for my investigation.

No matter.

It just means I have to dig a little deeper.

Without a minute to lose, I go to his desk and open his laptop, hopeful that maybe I can replace some dirt, or at the very least, some embarrassing porn that I can use against him.

“Damn it,” I exhale, frustrated when I see that his computer is password-protected.

My shoulders slump as I look around his desk, trying to see if there is any piece of information lying around that can help me crack into it. Unfortunately, after a quick glance, there doesn’t seem to be much here that looks to be of use to me. Not one to be defeated so easily, I start opening his desk drawers, one after another, and again I’m disappointed to replace there isn’t anything in them that shouts out password. Just some old motorbike magazines and some discarded change.

I spin around the room, hopelessness starting to set into my bones that this clandestine endeavor of mine will end up bearing no fruit. It’s only when my gaze falls on Noah’s bedside table on the other side of the room that I pause. Even though it’s a bit far from where I’m standing, I can still clearly see the photograph of a woman pushing a young boy on a swing set. My feet move before I even tell them to and walk over to it, picking up the frame in my hands to inspect the image closer.

There is no question in my mind that the boy in the picture is Noah, even if it doesn’t remotely look like him anymore. It isn’t the fact that the boy in the picture is so much younger than Noah is now—maybe only seven or eight, if I had to venture a guess—it’s the significant change in him. It’s the fact that he’s smiling that is so alarming. A real, genuine smile. One that I’ve never seen on his face before. I didn’t even think he’d be capable of such a thing.

And God, it’s beautiful.

Blindingly so.

My chest tightens seeing how happy he had been once. Such a contrast to the bitter, angry boy who has put my life in such a tailspin lately. If this version of Noah still existed, maybe we could have actually been friends instead of sworn enemies.

My gaze trails from his cheerful face and chubby cheeks to the cause of such happiness. The woman who stands behind him with a beaming, wide smile, laughing at her son’s joy. She has the same blonde hair and playful twinkle of mischief that her son’s eyes carry.

She is beautiful. Happy. Loved.

“Annabelle,” I whisper softly, the fist around my heart squeezing it to a pulp.

When I decided to invade Noah’s personal space, it was with the sole mission of replaceing something embarrassing that would put us on an even keel. I never thought I would replace such raw vulnerability that this memento of Noah’s mom represents. I swallow dryly, looking back down on his bedside table and see that this photograph isn’t the only thing he has of her. On closer inspection, I can see that there is a small shrine of sorts just for her.

A handkerchief with her initials embroidered in blue on it.

A butterfly hairpin, the same one she’s using to pull the hair away from her face in the photograph in my now trembling hands.

A book of poems.

And a velvet ring box that I don’t dare open.

Feeling overwhelmed with the display of such sad devotion, I carefully place the frame back on the table. I then take three huge steps back, not wanting to tarnish Noah’s need to keep his mom’s memory alive with my uninvited presence. Suddenly, my plan to sneak into his room for dirt feels like I’ve stepped over an invisible line that I should have never crossed.

I know what it feels like to lose a parent.

To not have them around anymore.

But my pain is so different from Noah’s.

My father chose to leave me.

His mom had no say in the matter.

She was ripped from his life in the cruelest of ways, and those types of wounds never heal fully.

It’s easier to pretend that you’re better off without a parent when they don’t want anything to do with you. But to accept a loss like Noah had to suffer feels excruciating to me. I’m not sure I could ever recover from it. If I lost my mom like that… God…just thinking about it makes me want to curl into a ball and cry.

This is not what I expected to replace when I came in here.

Not by a long shot.

And it sure as shit wasn’t meant for me to actually feel for Noah.

To care for him.

I shake my head, needing to expunge those thoughts from my mind and quickly turn around to leave. But just as I’m at his door, the devil on my shoulder whispers in my ear.

Annabelle.

That’s his password.

Shit.

I turn my head over my shoulder, staring at the computer on his desk that taunts me.

Am I that unscrupulous that I would use his dead mom’s name to get into his things?

Don’t do it, Sky.

Don’t you dare do it.

Not wanting to feel more like shit than I already do, I don’t question it when I rush to his desk and press the keys on his keyboard, spelling out the one name that means something to Noah. When his monitor springs to life, I’m even more disgusted with myself.

“It’s done now. No use in turning back,” I tell myself out loud, but it doesn’t ease the guilt I feel.

There is only one folder on his desktop, and on autopilot, I quickly click on it. My shame and guilt increase tenfold when all I replace are articles and pictures of sail boats.

Great.

I just stooped to my very lowest for nothing.

Serves me right.

But just as I close the monitor, the small hairs in the nape of my neck stand on end, and I don’t have to turn around to know I’ve been caught.

“You have exactly one minute to tell me what the fuck you’re doing in my room. Start talking.”

Shit.

Busted.